Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A psychotic or otherwise mentally ill person who exhibits violent or bizarre behavior. Not used in psychiatric diagnosis.
  • noun A person who has an excessive enthusiasm or desire for something.
  • noun A person who acts in a wildly irresponsible way.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Raving with madness; mad or crazy; insane.
  • noun One who raves with madness; a madman.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Raving with madness; raging with disordered intellect; affected with mania; mad.
  • noun A raving lunatic; a madman.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun An insane person, especially one who suffers from a mania.
  • noun A fanatic, a person with an obsession.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun an insane person
  • adjective wildly disordered
  • noun a person who has an obsession with or excessive enthusiasm for something

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[From Late Latin maniacus, maniacal, from Greek maniakos, from maniā, madness; see men- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Late Latin maniacus, from Ancient Greek μανιακός (maniakos), adjectival form of μανία (mania, "madness").

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  • Citation on yodel.

    September 15, 2008